Severely Annoying Beep Renders OS Usable

[sjkeach]

After booting my iMac running Snow Leopard with the latest updates this morning the volume adjust graphic displayed and automatically increased the volume to 100% complete with a constant clicking beep (the alert it makes when you increase the volume). Once at 100% the volume adjust graphic remained visible and the bleeping alert continued as the volume kept trying to increase but was already maxxed out. This has been constant for hours. In addition whenever attempting to select any icons or pictures within the finder the cursor automatically selects the icon in the lower most lefthand corner. While scrolling through menus at the top of the screen the choice highlighted jumps back in forth.

This glitch has rendered the OS useless and I have not been able to find a fix anywhere.

 

[chas_m]

Okay, first thing to do is silence that beep. Here's what to do: go to the sound control panel in system preferences and UNcheck the three little boxes, particularly the second one. That should stop the noise (but doesn't actually fix the problem). If that doesn't work, stick a pair of headphones in. It won't STOP the beep, but redirects it to the headphones so it will be dramatically quieter.

Second, what's happening is that the keyboard thinks the volume UP key is stuck down. You might try actually pressing the volume UP key on your keyboard, that might "unstick" it. I presume you've tried hitting the mute and/or volume down keys already without success, so this may not work but its worth a try.

Next, reboot your Mac. As soon as it reboots, hold down the command, option, P and R keys. Keep holding them until the Mac boot chime sounds at least three times, then let go. This is called a PRAM reset and may fix the problem.

Let us know if that worked!

 

[sjkeach]

Thanks for the response! I attempted both of those with no success. However I figured out the issue. I recently spilled water on my wireless keyboard and all the alphabet keys failed so I purchased a new one. Well, I stored what I thought was a broken wireless keyboard in a cabinet under my mac in an upside down position, with the bluetooth still powered on. Turns out, the volume up key still works on the old wireless keyboard! This was held in the down position due to me storing it upside down and the computer was getting a bluetooth signal from it still. I turned off the old wireless keyboard and everything works fine now!

 

[hughvane]

Excellent detective work - well done! Suggest you take the battery out of the old keyboard as well.

 

[bobtomay]

Glad you figured that one out. We could have gone around in circles for years and not had anyone get that.

 

[sjkeach]

Well I thought it was a bit odd that under the keyboard settings it displayed "Keyboard Battery Level: 46%" or something along those lines. So I'm like huh, my keyboard is wired. So that led me to investigate if my wireless keyboard was acting up.

Thanks for all the help anyways!